Dominating Norwegian win in Antholz Men’s Relay

Norway’s Vetle Sjaastad Christiansen anchored Norway to a dominating Antholz men’s 4 X 7.5 km relay victory this afternoon in 1:12:14.7. Taking the tag from third leg Johannes Thingnes Boe with a 1:02 lead, Christiansen stretched it out to 1:57.2 over second place Russia by the finish. Christiansen, JT, Tarjei Boe and Sturla Holm Laegreid used just four spare rounds in their victory. Russia in second place had a penalty and eleven spares. Germany, also with four spares finished third, 2:04.4 back.

BMW IBU World Cup Antholz Men's Relay 22

“One of our best relays”

Christiansen called Norway’s almost two-minute win one of their best. “It is a great performance from all the guys, I think. I think it is one of our best relays at least in my career. Almost winning by two minutes is almost like a dream, especially the last relay before the Olympics. We won the two races before and were a little bit unlucky with the IBU Cup guys in Ruhpolding but now we are back with a win. So, it gives us a lot of self-confidence before the Olympics and in the Relay Cup. We are very happy to win here.”

“Know what we are capable of”

Leadoff Laegreid emphasized the importance of this relay with the Olympic Winter Games just around the corner. It is a very important relay; the last one before the Olympics. It just feels confident when we all do four good legs. We know what we are capable of and we can do it again in the Olympics.”

France, with seven spares finished fourth,2:20.5 back. Canada with their best men’s relay result since their Bronze medal at the 2016 IBU World Championships, had a penalty and eight spares in fifth place, 2:31.5 back. Ukraine with eleven spares finished sixth, 2:38.7 back.

Sunny, light breeze and good shooting

Twenty-four teams lined up for the last relay before Beijing 2022 under brilliant blue skies above the snow-covered peaks, with the temperature hovering around freezing with a lighter breeze than the past couple of days. The first eight teams led by Russia, Norway and France all cleaned the prone stage in five shots. In standing, Fabien Claude cleaned with one spare as did Switzerland’s Sebastian Stalder; they headed for the exchange side-by-side, with Laegreid and Roman Rees 10 seconds back.

Tarjei in control

Claude tagged Guigonnat eight seconds ahead of Tarjei, with Switzerland, Belarus and Germany following at 20 seconds back. Half-way through their first loop, Tarjei came up just behind Guigonnat; the two came into prone together. The Norwegian cleaned in six shots, while his French rival needed two spares, allowing Philipp Horn and Serokhostov to catch up; the trio left the range 10 seconds back. Tarjei stretched the lead to 18 seconds by the standing stage. Shooting alone, he quickly closed the five targets with five shots as did Horn and Guigonnat, dropping the gap back to 10 seconds.

JT, adding to the lead

At the second exchange, Tarjei tagged his brother just 7.3 seconds ahead of Desthieux, after Guigonnat staged a comeback in the last half of his final loop. Loginov and David Zobel followed in third and fourth, but, 13.5 and 14.9 seconds back. JT immediately stretched the lead out, to over 22 seconds before his prone stage. With the wind flags completely flat, he cleaned in five shots and was gone. Zobel matched with Desthieux using a spare; they left 29 and 32.5 seconds back. Loginov used three extra shots, falling to 51 seconds from the lead. The leader shot five very fast perfect shots in standing before anyone else was on the range. Desthieux used a spare to clean but fell to 51 seconds back. Zobel added two in third, 1:02 back heading to the final exchange. Jules Burnotte moved Canada to fourth, 1:21 back just ahead of Loginov.

Clean standing for French relay rookie Perrot

JT was full throttle over his last 2.5 km, giving anchor Christiansen a 1:02 lead over Eric Perrot and 1:21 over Lucas Fratzscher and 1:25 over Eduard Latypov. The wind was up slightly for Christiansen’s prone stage, but he hit dead center with all five shots. Perrot hit the mat 35 seconds later, using two spare rounds to retain second position at 1:33 back, with Fratzscher leaving just 6 seconds farther back. Christiansen hit his first four standing shots, hesitated, and missed the last one. He reloaded with a little smile on his face and closed the final one, ensuring a dominating win for Norway. Over a minute later, Perrot in his first BMW IBU World Cup relay cleaned in five shots, putting France solidly in second, 11 seconds up on Fratzscher who added one spare round for Germany, with Latypov another 14 seconds back.

Comeback second place for Russia

The last loop was a simply a warm-down for Christiansen, as he ended a dominating relay win for Norway. In the last loop, Latypov and Fratzscher had tremendous last loops, powering past Perrot, with the Russian making a huge comeback to take second with Germany in third.

Unlucky Russian team

Even with the second-place finish, leadoff leg Anton Babikov admitted the Russian team was unlucky. “It was some bad moments, but we had a lot of unlucky moments today in the relay. But we feel that in the next race, our team will be lucky everywhere. I did not think about this part of the race now because we finished in the top and this is a nice moment…really great races here; I am proud of this.”

Zobel: “cool to be in the relay”

German third leg Zobel “It was an amazing race. It is always cool to be in the relay. With these three guys a lot of fun and with this weather and beautiful landscape, it was an amazing day. It was hard for me in the first loop because of Loginov, not the easiest guys. I knew I could not ski with them completely, but I tried to concentrate on my prone shooting. that was really good and then standing was hard but, in the end, I am quite happy.”

Photos: IBU/Thibaut

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